So I'm still trying to understand the basics pilots and the groups. So I have a few questions:

- What is the difference between the TRACOM and Reserve groups? I think TRACOM is just pilots that will help train my pilots so when they come out they will have higher exp? No idea what is the benefit to have pilots in the reserve areas (i.e. Fighter Reserve, Bomber Reserve). Because they would be better off in TRACOM? Can still 'get a veteran' from TRACOM?

- Can somebody please review my image of the pilot pool & replacement rate and tell me what is going on here? Think I know some of it, but not sure if this is good or bad. I have about 60 pilots with 80 > exp. in TRACOM.

1) TRACOM and Reserve are essentially the same, they are off-map holding/transfer pools. 2) pilots in TRACOM don't help w/ experience gain of trainees, but will speed up training of some of the pilots that are in your trainee-queue, you'll occaisionally see a msg in the Operations Report that X # of pilots have had training accelerated, or X # of pilots has moved from the 7-9 class to the 10-2 class. 3) Pilots go to the Reserve/TRACOM Pools w/ an ID 'tag' that identifies if they are Patrol, Fighter, Bomber, or Recon-types - supposedly you get an EXP drop if you xfer a Bomber guy into a Fighter sqn, but i've seen little evidence of this in my games. 4) Only pilots of 81+ EXP can go to TRACOM, though it's possible to get 81+ pilots into Reserve. I read awhile back in this forum that TRACOM worked in groups of 10 per nation/branch - in other words, if you had 5 IJN & 15 IJA pilots in TRACOM, that'd be the same as 0 & 10. 5) to get a TRACOM pilot into a sqn, look at the line immediately above the 'get veteran' button - directly to the right of the 2 'get new pilot(s)' buttons is a yellow text that you can click on to cycle thru Any, Replacement, Reserve, & TRACOM. this controls which bunch you'll get pilots from, if one of the texts is red, there's no pilots in that pool - if orange, there's not enough to fill the group. a parenthesized # gives the average EXP of pilots in that pool.

) Only pilots of 81+ EXP can go to TRACOM, though it's possible to get 81+ pilots into Reserve. I read awhile back in this forum that TRACOM worked in groups of 10 per nation/branch - in other words, if you had 5 IJN & 15 IJA pilots in TRACOM, that'd be the same as 0 & 10.

Thanks!

So in my screen shot what is going on for my training and is it normal? Below average or above? Why at times in the classes is the IJN higher exp than the IJA or the other way around? So that experience level has nothing to do with the TRACOM pilots (# or exp levels)?

but what you've got is a fixed # of pilots entering each branch of service, every month on the 1st day of the month. The # of pilots is fixed in the scenario design. Unlike the Allies, IJ must pay HI points for the entering pilots, so an IJ player must account for this when planning his industry & production.

these guys are 'trainee' pilots, think of them as living in various training bases around your territory, except they can't be attacked & never wash out due to incompetence. over time they ascend thru each of the 4 3-month training levels, gaining EXP and a very low amount of skill training. once they've completed the last phase of school, they 'graduate' to become 'replacement' pilots, which you can pull into your various on-map sqns. of course they'll then need lots of add'l training to become competent in various skills, before they'll be useful as anything other than food for enemy aces.

there's really nothing you can do to alter this 2-month process, so it's pretty much useless information that you don't need to worry about, except that you don't want to draw more than 100% of your replacement pilots into sqns, 'cos i think you'll start to dip into the trainees, & (if you're playing IJ) you MUST have enough HI points available in your industry pool on the last day of each month to cover the cost of new trainees, else the flow of replacement pilots will dip a year later & you'll be sad.

each nation/branch has a pre-set EXP # that graduating trainees are supposed to attain, for IJN it's 50(?), for IJA it's 40(?)(iirc). EXP #s for the Allies are generally lower. better check the manual for the true #s. anyway, many/most of your replacement pilots won't have quite that much EXP, a very few might have more. i wouldn't worry about the diff in IJN/IJA EXP in the middle classes, it might just be statistical noise. it's entirely normal that IJA pilots will graduate w/ ~10 less EXP than their IJA counterparts, so don't be thinking that your IJA guys are suffering.

anyhow that's my basic understanding of the system, but my knowledge is only partial. others might chime in here if what i've told you is wrong.

another thing or 3 about TRACOM - another while-back post i read here stated that TRACOM's action on trainees included a 'chance' that trainee EXP would increase, but forumeer Alfred (who never posts anything that's not 100% reliable) stomped on that notion (more than once). TRACOM *is* useful for speeding some trainees thru their schooling, & is also useful as a reserve - the IJ might be able to stockpile some 100's of master-blaster pilots during the course of the war, and unleash them to their best-equipped sqns in late '44 as part of a last-ditch defensive plan when training newbs won't really matter any more.

) Only pilots of 81+ EXP can go to TRACOM, though it's possible to get 81+ pilots into Reserve. I read awhile back in this forum that TRACOM worked in groups of 10 per nation/branch - in other words, if you had 5 IJN & 15 IJA pilots in TRACOM, that'd be the same as 0 & 10.

Thanks!

So in my screen shot what is going on for my training and is it normal? Below average or above? Why at times in the classes is the IJN higher exp than the IJA or the other way around? So that experience level has nothing to do with the TRACOM pilots (# or exp levels)?

How many trainee pilots enter the game is fixed by the scenario and are different for each country. For the Japanese, IJA and IJN are treated as different countires.

In your picture what is missing is the pilots in reserve (and TRACOM). The experience colomn is the average between what you see and what you don't see. You can view the reserve pool using the button at the bottom of the screen.

This is pretty much a no brainer for the Allied player. There really is not much of a risk of ever running out of pilots and accelerating pilots via the use of Tracom is not a priority. I do put top pilots there but only as away of keeping track of them. If they help my training so be it. Allied pilots tend to come on a lower exp levels but the Allies have two advantages in that their training locations are pretty safe whereas as the war progresses there are fewer Japanese bases not in range of Allied air power. And, the Allies get a constant flow of "named" pilots that show up directly in individual units. They get a lot of them where I don't think Japan does. They come with exp. levels usually in the 55 to 65 levels with some being quite better. However their individual skills are not too high and it is best to periodically cull them out of active squadrons for extra training and then put them in the reserve pool or back into the squadrons.

each nation/branch has a pre-set EXP # that graduating trainees are supposed to attain, for IJN it's 50(?), for IJA it's 40(?)(iirc). EXP #s for the Allies are generally lower.

The experience levels are set in the scenario. You can check (or change) the actual levels in the editor. In Scenario 1, both IJN and IJA replacements have 35 experience. In Scenario 2, the experience gets bumped up to 50 for IJN and 40 for IJA. Most of the Allies are 35 experience; USN has 40 experience, USAAF has 30, Chinese is 25. The experience levels can vary by year, and the Allies all go up in 1945.

These experience levels are theoretical averages. Individual replacement pilots will have experience that varies from the average by a random amount.

Replacement rates (the number of new pilots per month) are also set in the scenario, and vary by year.